The public diplomacy era – or the big chance

On Shabbat of Passover 5773, Israel made a great stride forward in energy independence.

Question: What do the natural gas that began to flow to our homes from the Tamar
reservoir, US President Barack Obama’s visit to Israel, and the expected
rapprochement between Israel and Turkey have in common? Answer: The new public
diplomacy.

And now for a more detailed answer. On Shabbat of Passover
5773, Israel made a great stride forward in energy independence. The Tamar gas
reservoir started to supply natural gas that could provide for the country’s
domestic needs in the next 20 years and also be used for export. On Passover,
the Festival of Freedom, Israel became independent (or almost independent) in
providing for its energy needs, apart from gasoline for automobiles. This
constitutes a significant change in the country’s economic situation, as well as
its international status. Instead of openly or secretly courting energy
suppliers, Israel has become a player in this field. Moreover, it has additional
reservoirs that have not yet been explored and that may enhance the dimensions
of the gas discovery.

Thus, Israel has reinforced its image as a state
with hard power. States with hard power are characterized by a strong,
independent economy and significant military and technological abilities. In
other words, they are global or regional powers that are capable of deterring
any enemy or of using force to impose world or regional order.

Israel is
a regional power that has proven its military capability, both against armies
(the last of which was in the First Lebanon War that started in 1982) and in
asymmetric confrontations such as with the Palestinians in the second intifada,
with Hezbollah in 2006 and with Hamas in 2009 and 2012. Israel is a secure
country, notwithstanding the Iranian threat, which must not be underestimated
but which it is also able to overcome alone or with the help of the
international community.

The new economic capability the gas gives us
also reinforces our ability to withstand extended military conflicts and to open
up new channels based on economic interests between us and neighboring or more
remote states. This joins our diverse exports to Europe, the Far East and the US
and the impressive achievements of Israel’s hi-tech industry. This is hard power
at its best, which our enemies, both near and far, respect and take into account
when threatening Israel.

THE SECOND element that was mentioned in our
equation is soft power, which Obama demonstrated over the past few weeks.
Sometimes, it is best to observe the actions of others and to learn from them
and implement them. Let’s take a look at how the president of the US acted: He
understood that Israel, particularly the public, has reservations about his open
gestures toward the Arab and Muslim world, that Israel does not have faith in
his economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran, and that the Israeli public gives
him a low ranking and mistrusts him. So, in a pure gesture of public diplomacy,
Obama decided to give Israel top priority at the beginning of his second
term.

His first presidential visit in this term was to Israel. He
preceded the visit with an interview on Israeli television, in which he employed
the best of his rhetorical skills for the cameras. He amazed us with small human
gestures such as giving an informal flavor to the visit, short conversations
with various people that testified to prior preparation, and countless photo ops
with soldiers at Ben-Gurion Airport, children at the President’s Residence and
others. He let Israel market itself as it would like to be seen: a combination
of military ability and modern technology alongside an age-old history and deep
roots expressed in the Dead Sea Scrolls. And of course, how could he forgo the
indelible memories of the Holocaust and its deep effect on the lives of the
Jewish people and the State of Israel? He went with the flow, as they say, with
the people, the places and the issues, and it came naturally to
him.

Above all, of course, were his public appearances, particularly his
speech at the Jerusalem International Convention Center. Here the public
diplomacy whiz targeted the Israeli public, particularly the young generation,
speaking to them above the heads, or maybe below the belts, of the government to
convince them that the time for peace between Israel and the Palestinians had
come. He crafted his speech around three essential components: security, peace
and prosperity, molding them together in a message that he placed in their laps,
telling them: The ball is now in your court, you must decide what you want to do
with it.

That is the way of public diplomacy, which differs from the
world of government versus government and includes publics and individuals from
other countries as central players and legitimate participants in the
international relations arena. (That is one of the primary areas I address in my
recently published book, Media Wars, which deals with Israel and the new public
diplomacy.) Obama studied Israel’s soft power, composed of values, history and
culture, and demonstrated this when he returned to the White House and held a
traditional Passover Seder. This is the ultimate expression of the Israeli
narrative of the transition from slavery to freedom and of the struggle for
liberty. This is the essence of the soft power that Israel would like to impart
to the world and that it expects to serve its relations in the international
arena.

IT IS not surprising, therefore, that the third element in the
question I asked at the outset was Israeli-Turkish relations. These relations
have taken a blow and have deteriorated in recent years. Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan has attacked Israel on every international platform,
including a public confrontation with President Shimon Peres at Davos. He even
recently stated that Zionism is a crime against humanity. Throughout all this,
however, economic and defense cooperation between the two countries continued to
flourish, and it appeared as though Israel was swallowing the Turkish
president’s double game and was willing to live with it. But the situation
exploded with the Mavi Marmara flotilla affair.

The flotilla, which was
supported by the IHH, a Turkish non-governmental organization, and included
Turkish citizens among its passengers, was stopped and boarded by the Israel
Navy. Nine Turkish citizens were killed in the confrontation. At this point, the
rhetoric became reality, and Israeli-Turkish relations were officially broken
off.

But life in our region is full of surprises, and since the encounter
between the Israeli commandoes and the IHH activists, the Middle East has
undergone a dramatic change. The Arab Spring has shaken up many Arab states,
including Egypt, Jordan and Syria, and continues to do so. Syria has a border
with Turkey, Jordan and Israel which has degenerated and serves as a passage for
refugees.

More than ever, Turkey and Israel are perceived as islands of
stability, that maintain democracy and share a common concern about the
developments in the neighboring states. Both countries have a common interest in
stopping development of a nuclear Iran, which, if it materializes, will change
the face of the Middle East, placing Iran against Turkey, Israel, Europe and the
entire international community.

It is therefore not surprising that the
immediate, direct result of Obama’s visit here was to remove the obstacles to a
rapprochement between Israel and Turkey. The truth is that the main moves had
already been made in secret negotiations between Turkish and Israeli
representatives, but ultimately Obama’s pressure was needed, and he reaped the
immediate fruits of his public diplomacy efforts. He pushed Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu to the telephone conversation with Erdogan, in which he
participated and in which Netanyahu apologized for “operational mistakes” that
took place in the raid on the Turkish ship.

We all know that there were
no “operational mistakes” and that Israel had to use force to stop the ship, but
more than two years later, it is clear that the Marmara affair is marginal and
unimportant compared to what Netanyahu himself described as the tectonic
upheavals in the Middle East. Thus, public diplomacy worked again. What was
needed was not secret diplomatic activity, but a complex and even painful public
act to set out on the long trek to repair Israeli-Turkish
relations.

NETANYAHU’S CONSIDERATION was correct: Israel can handle
Erdogan’s victory parade up to a certain point, after which America, which is a
party to this move, can hold Erdogan up and calm him down. After all, Turkey
needs Israel no less than Israel needs Turkey. Israel’s willingness to put its
honor aside to pacify Turkey (perhaps, for a change, the Israeli ambassador sat
on a lower chair than the Turkish ambassador) proved that it is capable of
combining hard and soft power to demonstrate smart power.

It is clear to
all that we cannot survive on one of these powers alone. They are
interdependent, especially in the tough neighborhood in which we
live.

Hard power is important and irreplaceable, but it is not enough and
needs to work together with soft power to prepare Israel for membership in the
international community, such as the important membership in the OECD, which
only accepts democracies.

Smart power requires the right
balance.

We are now facing a new chapter in the Middle East.

Obama
has returned to Washington, leaving the Palestinian problem – the hot potato –
in our hands. He has other problems to worry about, such as North Korea and the
American economy. He has left us to deal with our own issues, expecting that the
public, followed by the government, will understand that it is first and
foremost in Israel’s interests to promote a settlement with the Palestinians. He
left a similar message with the Palestinian Authority and its president. He told
them things in a similar spirit, but stressed, correctly, that the key is in the
hands of the stronger party, not the weaker one, and the strong party must be
the one to make the first move if it is really interested in a
settlement.

At the end of a week like this, in which Israel’s hard power,
and its security, have been significantly empowered, it can and is even obliged
to set negotiations in motion as soon as possible to demonstrate the use of that
same smart power that we knew how to use in the Israeli-Turkish saga.

■ The
writer is a Labor MK. His recently published book, Media Wars, deals with Israel
and the new public diplomacy.

Sites Of Interest

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